Bus rants, Beagles & Beautiful Things

Outfit: The Power of the Twirl

When I was young, I got a new dress. Guys, this dress was bloody hideous. It was midi length and bottle green, with long, cream, blousy sleeves and ornate filigree buttons all the way down the front. It was damn ugly. God I loved that dress, though. I thought it was the height of sophistication back then (probably because it looked like something a 50 year old woman would have worn rather than a 10 year old girl…) and wore it to literally every special occasion I had the chance to – my Grandad’s Birthday dinner, school discos, sleepovers… I even wore it to a Summer Fayre once and nearly choked myself doing somersaults on the bouncy castle. Not really practical bouncy castle attire…

Thing is, back then we didn’t have a lot of money, so new clothes – above and beyond the usual requirements anyway – were a treat. So it wasn’t just about the look of the dress, it was the way it made me feel when I put it on. The dress was special to me, and so I felt special in it, and that largely came down to one thing – the twirl in the skirt.

Did you ever have a frock as a child that would spin out to the sides as you twirled around? That made you want to spin and spin and spin until you fell down? That’s how this dress was, and even now, a frock or a skirt with a good bit of twirl in it just somehow has the power to transport me back into the mindset of a 10 year old girl, all giddy and excited about her new dress.

Which is a long way of explaining the daft look on my face in most of these pictures! This ASOS dress is a couple of years old now, but pleated midis seem to be enjoying a bit of a resurgence right now, which pleases me no end. I don’t end up wearing it too often as it’s a little skimpy in nature so better suited to sunnier climes, but whenever I wear it I get a goofy grin on my face and feel the urge to twirl about like a kid on a sugar high!

Ah, the power of a good twirl. If only we could solve all our problems the way we did when we were young!